Under the hood, they run ChromiumOS, including things like trusted boot (yes, this home router has a tpm), and the A/B partitions so when you get an automatic update, (which happens during a time of low bandwidth usage), it reboots into the new version in about 6 seconds. The security team is awesome: they pushed an update to all onhubs within 48 hours of public disclosure of a critical RCE earlier this year.
There has been some slowness to expected features, like ipv6, but the PMs have been clear about their goal: they won't include a feature that's buggy. It's exactly what you want in a piece of infrastructure.
How could they launch such a faulty product. If it was 3 years ago maybe, but it's not really optional now.
Except it's not, we live in an IPv4 world.
Edit: How are you guys downvoting me on your v6 connections? HN only supports v4.
* Eero: https://eero.com/
* Ubuquiti: https://www.ubnt.com
* Cisco: http://www.cisco.com (sized for larger buildings)
Does this new Google device come with the Google Fi feature which backhauls all your traffic to Google via a VPN?
Personally, for my home I need just two units. Shame there's no $199 2-pack yet. It would be an instant buy for me.
3-pack $300 or $100/item
2-pack $230 or $115/item
1-pack $130 or $130/itemThis was started as a kickstarter campaign and they have just begun shipping out the first units.
Like the Google APs, Portal can form a mesh and automatically figure out which channels have the least interference.
Overview : https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202076
Extending: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204617
WDS: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4262
While the wireless distribution mode drops speed (as does Ubiquiti etc.) it's still faster than a DoCIS 3 cable modem, and the Airport Express for end nodes is cheap.
Not applicable.
The purpose of Google Connectivity Services is to provide protected access (encrypted via VPN) to the Internet on an unsecured 802.11 network like one that you'd encounter at a coffee shop.
In that case, GCS sets up a tunnel from your phone to Google's edge network, traffic from your phone egresses via an IP address dedicated to GCS and then you're surfing the Interwebs.
If you've entered a SSID and a related PSK or WEP password (as one typically does on a home network), GCS isn't available to use.
Use of GCS is optional. It can be disabled as desired.
I'm seeing about a dozen fancy modern wifi routers all trying to solve a problem I'm not sure exists.
Last year I bought an Edge router and a higher end Netgear hotspot. Works wonders separating things out and letting me easily add separate "Guest" wireless networks on different channels or whatever using my older devices.
If I were to have done that change now I would've definitely used a device like Google's. But to do something like that would've been outside my budget. I wish I could easily add new hotspots that just seamlessly worked so that I could eliminate the dead spots on the edges of my house and in my yard over time.
Maybe there's something I don't know already and I don't need Google's new Wifi System. But it definitely seems to fix my usecase.
I too have bought a variety of high end consumer devices (for a small business), and they all crash or randomly drop out.
Disable wifi radio on router, plug in Unifi AP, solid connection.
They are annoying to configure, but have been so worth it.
Apple AirPort has also been rock solid.
Ubiquiti has wifi APs and you can add them whenever youd like. They automatically detect the existing APs and download their config.
Is the issue just that the non-Apple-customer market didn't have a good analogue?
All the experience I've always had with wifi in the last ~10 years has been abysmal. I play games and make a lot of use of internet (downloading, working through ssh sessions, etc) and the slight hiccup and packet loss is very evident in my system and frustrates me a lot. When I am playing games and there's a slight interference, I notice immediately. When I am chatting on irc through ssh and my keystrokes don't go through due to spotty wifi, I notice immediately. Sometimes it's unbearable. I think this idea is really great. I had to finetune my wifi so many times in all the apartments I've lived at. Using channel analysers to pick the correct one every once in a while (due to recurring congestion/interferences), living in a very crowded area I often have ~30 access points broadcasting and cluttering and it's really obvious in the performance of my network.
In the last apartment I was staying at (moved out a few days ago), every time my flatmate at the opposite side of the house would open the living room door to walk to the bathroom, my signal would experience a latency spike of 100-200ms (average would be 10-20). We had a pretty poor router, to be honest, and I was at the other side of the apartment, but it was simply ridiculous. At times it would just refuse to work and I couldn't browse the internet for a few minutes simply because of too much congestion.
I think this idea with multiple smart access points is simply genius and while I plan to use wired connection for my next apartment, I'm definitely looking forward to a better implementation of the currently abysmal wifi that we have in general.
Anything that allows me to just say "go buy this" instead of having to troubleshoot their cheap ISP-provided combo access point/router is a win in my book....
If I lived in a less dense area, in a wood-framed house of the same size, I have no doubt my wifi would be just fine. But with all the interference from neighbors and all the reinforced concrete, my home wifi definitely has a problem that requires something more than the simplest, cheapest router to solve.
This Google product might work very well for my use case, though I'm happy enough with my current solution.
The problem in NYC is that there's just too much band crowding; adding more access points is only going to provide an improvement (if any at all) until everyone else does it, too, and then it's going to be worse for everyone.
We really need better solutions for extremely high-density deployment of competing WiFi networks.
I really can't imagine a house that would not be entirely serviced by a single one of those.
I still get 3 bars on my iPhone 30 meters down my driveway, let alone in the house.
I got one because we use them at work, and I was still getting usable internet in a supermarket 100 meters from my office across a parking lot.
They are designed for commercial use so initial setup is a bit complicated and requires java, but I have to recommend it.
edit Not saying that Google's system fixes this but some users require nicer routers for that connection. I should note my actual computer gets an ethernet because I can never achieve on wireless what I can on wired!
With stock ISP router, I see occasional connectivity problems with several devices connected and one of them is streaming video (even though there is more than enough upstream bandwidth capacity to handle multiple devices streaming), all reasonably close to the router, and greater problems when one is farther from the router (even without any of the streaming video), in a relatively modest suburban house (<1500sf).
Anecdotally, I've seen lots of similar complaints from other people.
This access point 'network' uses each other to make a mesh network, increasing the chance that the nearest access point has a connection to the base access point, which has a connection to the internet.
We got an Eero to try to fix the coverage problem (I lived with several housemates), but it didn't let us choose between 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz, it would switch dynamically. Certain IoT devices we had were 2.4Ghz and worked intermittently. No matter what router we used, no matter how expensive, the issue there never went away. There were ways to force the 5Ghz band on the client side using some BSSID hacks, but it was cumbersome. So we had to switch back to a single router setup with two networks, one 2.4Ghz and one 5Ghz, and urge people to only use the 2.4Ghz network if absolutely necessary.
I live elsewhere now and use a cheap 802.11ac TP-Link router without any issues in a house for a 200mbps connection.
Edit: Oops, I should probably say something about improved wifi as well, as that was the point of the parent comment! :P
Needless to say my ISP's aforementioned modem router struggled to cover our typically average (for the UK) 3 bed semi. I even had a wired network point installed in my office upstairs, which I've barely used since we chucked it out. We can pick up the Asus router half way down the street!
that alone creates plenty of noise to wade through...
I could've fussed with placement of the old router, hunted through the channels, installed different firmware, or whatever -- but I don't spend that much time at home, and that's no longer what I'm interested in fiddling with.
I personally do need multiple routers to get wifi throughout the house.
Oddly, it basically did solve it except in a couple places in my house until a few weeks ago when the drop-outs got a lot worse (again, at the edges). The conspiracy theroists will love that. :-)
A real problem is that 2.4GHz is crowded not just by wifi but by other things. My old AP I couldn't use when I used my Microwave, and it is a brand new high end microwave. Not something I'd expect to leak. The OnHub did much better than the previous Buffalo (which in other locations has worked great for me).
So, you want to go 5.2GHz, because there is more spectrum. But there is also less interference because --- wait for it --- it doesn't go as far and penetrate walls as well. Which reduces interference. But it really means you want an AP directly in the rooms where you use WiFi the most. Which means you want something like this where multiple APs can cooperate.
The OnHub also is supposed to have stupendous antennas and multiple radios, even allowing it to do spectrum surveys. That's according to the marketing literature.
But it's not just me. My inlaws just built a 4600 ft^2 house and their A/V guy installed a AP in the centrally located laundry room. Wifi was terrible in the living room, and unusable in half the other rooms. Not sure if it was a crappy AP, or the location or what. I put another AP in the Livingroom and solved most of their pressing problems. But when I go back at Christmas I expect to put in an OnHub or Eero or AmpliFi... They have Ethernet all over the house, so I want something that can do wired meshing like the Eero. The AmpliFi doesn't seem to support it, IIRC, and the OnHub doesn't say anything about it with todays release, but the old OnHub is supposed to support it, according to a line item in their FAQ. I'm skeptical until I see it.
My brother in laws new house ALSO has similar problems. He had wireless drop outs, and was going to get the Eero, but I pointed him at the AmpliFi, which he got and has been VERY happy with.
If Google WiFi supports wired meshing, I will probably get that. If not, I'll either get a second OnHub, or maybe switch to the AmpliFi, especially if AmpliFi supports wired meshing and PoE. Ubiquity's cameras support PoE, so I'm hopeful there.
So, do these fancy products solve a problem that doesn't exist? Well, I'm glad your wifi works so well. But I'm definitely having problems at home, and am not alone. At least at work the WiFi is pretty uncomplicated, oddly enough since we have steel stud construction.
After some fussing, I bite the bullet and went back to Xfinity. I have a Netgear AC1750 router and an Aaris modem and I've never had coverage or speed issues in my house.
It's about slowly caching the top 100 YouTube videos and then moving them quickly to whatever device you want to watch them on.
On a different note, is there any reason why someone should prefer this to Ubiquiti's AmpliFi? Unlike Google, Ubiquiti has a long history of making networking gear. The only obvious benefit I see right now is Google Wifi starts at $129 for one unit whereas AmpliFi starts at $199, but that $199 includes 2 "mesh points" and presumably to get the same effect with Google Wifi you'd have to shell out $299 for the 3-pack.
There's also an inconvenient truth that such problems are greatly hindered by … Google in their prominent role improving security for average users. If their goal was to spy on people, they'd be the last to push HTTPS, HSTS, HKP, various TLS hardening, etc. rather than one of the first.
Conspiracies do happen from time to time. Unfortunately the term "conspiracy theory" is often used to refer to unreasonable theories that are more about reinforcing preconceptions about what ought to be instead of observing what the situation actually is.
Obviously it is important to check any theory, and extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. In this case, however, the claim that Google wants to get their hands on as much data as possible isn't an extraordinary claim. It isn't a conspiracy which is usually defined as a secret plan. Google is very open about their business model based on analyzing large amounts of data with modern techniques.
Calling concerns about giving even more data to Google a "conspiracy theory" not only ignores Google's business model, it also dilutes the term making an actual secret conspiracy harder to identify in the future.
> think about just how many people use Google search, Gmail, Chrome, Android, etc.
The only service that is similar to sending all of your traffic to Google is GA (Google Analytics), which most people are not using willingly. Yes, a lot of damaging analysis can be done from search/mail/etc, which is why it's a terrible idea to also include the rest of your internet traffic.
> improving security for average users
Google has done a lot of work to keep user data safe from third parties. Very little of that work prevents Google itself from seeing your data. When the default configuration isn't end-to-end encrypted, in practice this means Google is still seeing everything. Google even calls this a feature that is part of their "assistant".
> If their goal was to spy on people
So you don't think their business is based on spying on users in various ways for better ad targeting? Even though Serge Brin and Larry Page personally explained their intention to spy to CA State Sen. Liz Figueroa?
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/the-robot-defense-...
This is what I think of every time I hear of Google Fiber.
Do you get upset when a new phone is introduced a year after you bought your last one? A new car?
Of course, those of us seasoned with the experience of buying Google products before should know better, but it really doesn't change the fact that people who bought it are absolutely right to feel upset.
[1]: https://www.amazon.fr/Netgear-WN3000RP-200FRS-R%C3%A9p%C3%A9...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8updJWoSxE
http://www.securityelectronicsandnetworks.com/articles/2014/...
[0]: https://www.sigmobile.org/mobicom/2015/papers/p90-aliA.pdf
This is misleading. You can create your own mesh networks with several off-the-shelf routers / access points using open source software like batman-advanced [0].
Mesh networks automatically judge the path of least resistance to a destination, and distribute the state of all the access points on a network. If one access point goes down, all the access points previously connected to the faulty access point will find alternatives if there's anything else within signal range.
In this case, if those are meant to be portable access points, you can move them between different rooms without worrying about nodes choosing a suboptimal path.
More relevantly, for instead of by (though its quite possible both are true), but, sure, in a small urban apartment, coverage isn't going to be your big issue, and you aren't going to need a set of routers forming a mesh network.
OTOH, lots of people don't live in small urban apartments and use the internet.
Such a weird and negative comment. Are you alright? I mean, such negativity surely has got to come from somewhere?